


Collision

by AlamoGirl80



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Cullen vs Solas, Drama, F/M, Jealousy, Nightmares, Pining, Possessive Behavior, Size Difference, Solas is a jealous egg, Solas is an Egg, but I still love him, i will always have a size kink, solas can be a vindictive dick, two guys one girl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-27 15:24:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15688167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlamoGirl80/pseuds/AlamoGirl80
Summary: The one wherein Cullen loves the Inquisitor... and so does Solas. Two powerful guys vying for the same woman? Couldn't possibly go wrong, could it?





	Collision

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'ed so all mistakes are my own. Hey Bioware, could you make with the DA4 before I turn 40? Because that would be great!

If someone had told Cullen Rutherford that he would be commanding a brand new army, under the banner of the Inquisition of all things, he’d have called them a lunatic. To this day he still doesn't know what possessed him to say yes to the stern, challenging face of the Seeker when she found him in that seedy tavern after Kirkwall.

Maybe a part of him still believe the Maker had use of him. Maybe he just had nothing else to lose.

But he’d agreed and now Cullen finds himself arranging books, papers and personal items he’d forgotten he had in his new office on the battlements of Skyhold. He aches all over, the fatigue from the trials of simply surviving the fall of Haven and then the trek through the mountains has suddenly hit him. Sighing, Cullen straightens and rubs the back of his neck, closing his eyes for a moment as he wills his muscles to loosen. Andraste help him, it feels good to take a moment to breathe. 

Skyhold is steadily filling with recruits and refugees and he knows he’ll have to deal with the training - because for the love of the Maker some of these new lieutenants don’t know their arses from a shield defense - but he’ll deal with that later.  He needs a break, some air.

Cullen moves to the walkway that runs between the battlements and the main Keep, letting the crisp mountain air ruffle his hair and tingle his cheeks. As he leans his forearms on the stone railing, eyes roaming the courtyards, Cullen lets all the pathways and worries of his mind narrow down to one person. The one who started all of this. Who fell from the Fade and is tasked with uniting Thedas against an insurmountable force. 

A bare slip of an elf girl who’d captured the minds and hearts of the nation. A mage - _Maker’s breath_ \- a MAGE of all things. Cullen shakes his head ruefully and chuckles.  

A mage who’d captured his mind and heart as well. He won't deny it anymore, he’d been smitten since he first laid eyes on her in Haven. He thought he’d out grown this propensity for wearing his heart on his sleeve when it comes to mage girls, but apparently, Cullen is doomed to want what he’s not meant to have. 

Cullen searches through the crowds, watching for her distinctive snowy hair and lithe frame. He catches sight of her finally, stepping out of the main hall. 

 _Maker,_ she all but glows, he thinks.  

The Inquisitor has grown more into her role over the last few weeks, but in the few private moments they’ve shared, Cullen has seen toll the weight of the Inquisition has taken on her young soul. She's terrified of failing and it makes the protective beast that dwells in Cullen’s heart snarl and rage; to take the burden from her small shoulders. To spirit her away and shield her from all. 

She’s a ferocious fighter but a timid thing with him, shifting her weight nervously and eyeing him warily, and Cullen has tried so SO hard to set her at ease. They’ve shared a few moments of levity and Cullen knows he’s not imagining the subtle flirts she’s sent his way. So he’s relatively certain his feelings toward her are not misplaced. But the Inquisitor is still ill at ease around him and he’d give the very blood of Andraste to find out why and remedy it. 

Cullen watches as the Inquisitor - Ishara - turns to speak to someone, the sun glints off that snowy hair, the sapphire blue tunic she wears sets off those turquoise eyes and Cullen’s heart stutters in his chest. He can’t help himself, he feels like a teenager once again, cheeks heating up ( _because he never outgrew the blushing either, dammit to Hell_ ). 

Sometimes just the way she moves makes Cullen ache from his chest to his balls. He's about to head toward her, already thinking of what he wants to ask her, when he notices to whom she’s been speaking. 

The apostate, Solas, always seems to be in the right place at the right time. Whether it's to aide with closing the Breach or just _happening_ to know where to find a long lost stronghold in the middle of the Frostbacks, Solas _seems_ to have all the answers. And it makes Cullen’s teeth itch. There’s something about the unassuming bald elf that sets Cullen’s instincts on edge ever so slightly.

Not as badly as the instance with the recruit-turned-abomination in Kirkwall that he fought alongside the Champion, but … its a near thing. 

And then he sees it: the body language of the apostate as he bends toward the Inquisitor as if to impart some wisdom. There’s a hunger in the elf’s eyes, one Cullen recognizes all too well. He’s seen it often enough in the mirror when thoughts of Ishara won’t leave him. Solas’ eyes rove the Inquisitor’s body when she looks away, and he leans down, looms over her, as if he’d like nothing better than to cage her in his arms and drag her off to… 

...The sound of creaking leather startles him out of those thoughts. Cullen finds himself strangling the pommel of his sword so tightly the leather grip is groaning under the pressure. His jaw aches for grinding his teeth. 

So, the apostate has feelings for his Inquis - _the_ Inquisitor - as well, then? That would explain the venom in Solas’ voice any time he speaks with Cullen.  

He watches the elf lean in to touch Ishara’s arm - a low rumble bubbles up from Cullen’s chest before he can stop it. He has to actually glance around the bridge to make sure no one else heard him. 

Cullen starts to formulate an excuse to interrupt the two elves, something that needs the Inquisitor’s attention. 

With him. 

Right now. 

Away from Solas. 

It’s juvenile and petty. Cullen knows this. He tries to convince himself of these things as he steps up to the two elves. 

But its all for naught the minute Ishara’s large innocent eyes lock on his and she smiles wide and welcoming. Cullen’s brain fogs for a moment - _wha..what was he doing again? Oh yes…_  

The excuse sounds remarkably legitimate as he suggests the Inquisitor come with him. She’s suddenly serious, for the matter he’d thrown out sounds like it is important and, Maker damn him, Cullen can’t and won’t stop the smirk pulling at his scarred lips. He even takes it a bit further - stealing his arm around Ishara’s tiny frame. 

She fits perfectly against him. Like she was made to be slotted into his side, _always_ , and when he looks over her head at Solas, he finds he doesn’t give two good shits about the red rage he sees in the apostate’s eyes.  

The mage’s fists are balled and Cullen raises a brow in naked challenge as he herds his Inquisitor away under the protective bulk of his armored arm. 

Cullen may be older, more seasoned. But there’s still enough of the cocksure Templar in him who’s more than willing to fight for his heart’s desire. 

 _Mine,_ he thinks at Solas, certain the mage gets his meaning. _But nice try…_  

Somewhere Cullen thinks he hears a tent catch fire, but he’s not terribly bothered.

 

\-----------------------------

 

Solas has spent too long asleep. There are too many things in this new world that take him aback. The enslavement of his people, Corypheus utilizing his orb to bring all of Thedas to its knees… just to name a few. 

He certainly never planned on the meeting a Dalish mage who could close the rifts with a gesture and revive the heart within him he thought long dead and cold. He knew the moment he watched her wade into the breach at the Temple of Sacred Ashes that first time - a wraith thin girl with naught but will, a mysterious mark on her hand and no understanding of how important she would be - that he would follow her anywhere. 

It wasn’t part of his plan, this “falling” feeling  that swoops low in his stomach whenever Ishara is near. Solas is older than most can imagine and yet he cannot remember the last time he’d felt this way for anyone. Even as young Pride, at the side of the most powerful and beautiful creatures in the Evanuris, he’d never met anyone who aroused such feelings of _Want_ within him. 

And oh, but Solas _wants_.  

He craves her in a way that almost frightens; keeps him awake at night thrusting his cock angrily into his fist like a frustrated adolescent. Ishara seeks his counsel in many things, and he delights in weaving the tales of her ancestors around his trips into the Fade. He loves that she asks after his spirit friends and he drowns in her river stone colored eyes as she hangs on his words as he tells her of the old battles he’s relieved on the Other Side. 

But though he’s certain the Inquistor would consider them friends, her romantic energy seems to be aimed at another. And that makes Solas’ blood boil. 

He makes no excuses for his preference to keep to his own race in matters of sex, and he’s never claimed any kinship with the Dalish. But it galls that Ishara seems to have chosen a _Shemlen_ , and a former Templar at that. It's almost insult to injury.  

But perhaps like his namesake, Solas is nothing if not stubborn. He and Cullen have spent the last couple of months sparring back and forth for the Inquisitor’s attention. And though Solas has fought by her side all over Ferelden and Orlais, it is to Cullen’s side she returns when they arrive back at Skyhold.

Solas seethes at the thought of the former Templar’s hands on her marble-like skin, his mouth on her perfect, peach firm breasts… his cock taking her first maiden’s blood… 

A string of elven curses flies from his mouth as several vases explode in a rainbow of glass shards around his rotunda. Solas knows the former Templar has, by now, taken her virginity and it’s nearly driven him insane… sharpens his anger and causes him to lean toward cruelty in battle.  Immolating a few Red Templars more slowly than necessary has even gained the notice of his Inquisitor, but he won’t give her a reason. 

It isn’t until they return from a mission - before he can even think of a reason to get the Inquisitor’s attention, she’s off to Cullen’s office - that matters come to a head. He tortures himself watching the Commander meet her at the door, gathering the tiny mage in his arms and hugging her tightly. He kisses her hair and neck before capturing her mouth, his bulk encompassing her small frame as he bends her backward, devouring. 

Solas is nearly sick. And then he formulates a plan. 

Entering the dreams of others isn’t hard for one who knows how to manipulate the Fade. He’d done it with the Inquisitor once, and now, Solas searches for a new target. 

The dream is exactly what he’d expect from the Commander: it flits, as dreams do, between moments Cullen has experienced, to things he secretly wishes for, to random scenes that make little sense but to the mind of the dreamer. Solas hides himself as the dream moves through moments from Cullen’s childhood, bucolic and idealized, to his times with the Templars; the joy of besting his superiors in sparring. 

Solas almost has to pull out when the scenery melds around him a darkened room, lit by firelight and two bodies on the fur rug floor. He sees sweat and skin: sun tanned and scarred skin, thickly muscled overlaying a pure marble-white body, flushed red with passion. He doesn't know if this is a remembrance of an event or a wish for the future, but Solas has to bite his lip until it bleeds to keep from roaring in fury as he watches the Commander taking the Inquisitor from behind.

Cullen nearly covers the small frame beneath him, braced on one hand, the other holding her hip as he rocks into her with barely restrained thrusts. His head rests on her neck, expression caught between a pained grimace and pure ecstasy. Maybe he’s whispering words of love to her, his lips are moving in a litany. Ishara’s lovely white hair is nearly grey with sweat, her head hung between the brace of her arms as she strains to hold herself to counter his thrusts, his weight knocking her forward. 

Solas thinks he can hear the wet slap of skin, smell the sex in the room, and just manages to rip himself from that scene before he’s forced to hear Cullen groan her name. 

After that, Solas gathers his Will around himself to manipulate the Fade and form the nightmare he’d planned.

\----

 

Cullen shifts as the dream he’s been enjoying peaks, he can almost feel Ishara’s pert arse pressed against him as he rocks his cock shallowly in and out of her from behind before thrusting in hard and deep, _Maker yes yes YES_ … and then it changes… 

He looks around: stone walls, the stink of dead flesh and old blood. Magic crackles and burns. 

 _No. Oh … Maker no… not again…_  

The Circle Tower solidifies around Cullen and he feels the bottom fall out of his stomach. The barrier of his magical prison sizzles malevolently around him and to his abject horror, Cullen can smell the rot of the bodies that had been left in his cell with him. 

 _It's a dream. It’s a dream it has to be it’s only a dream WAKE UP CULLEN.._ He screams at himself.  

The Demon comes then, to torment him with images of things he could never have, to show him the deaths of those he’d sworn to protect. Friends, his family, it always, ALWAYS shows him Amell’s horrific death. 

Cullen screams and cowers, holding his head in his hands as he tries to shut it out. It never works. 

This time, however, the Demon shows him a new vision. Corypheus’ huge clawed hand holding a small body, limp and broken. Hair that had once been white now rust red and brown with blood and gore. 

 _“You could never have saved her. You simply aren’t good enough, Commander. You aren’t powerful enough to protect your love.”_  

Cullen cannot breathe. His heart has stopped, he’s sure of it. He can’t even summon a scream, command his muscles to move. He’s paralyzed in terror. 

 _“You will fail her,_ ” the Demon purrs. _“Just as you’ve failed others before.”_  

Cullen comes awake with a deafening scream that probably wakes all of Skyhold. He sits up and curls around his knees as he shakes, covered in sweat, gasping for air. 

When he comes to his senses, he realizes the Inquisitor has been thrown from the bed. She stands a the bedside, disheveled and lovely, large turquoise eyes rounded in fear. He knows she’s talking but he can’t hear her words. Cullen can't bear to see the fear in her eyes, can’t stand the terror still stabbing his soul, so he lets his head fall to his knees and sobs. 

Cool hands caress his shoulders, velvet lips press to his head and hair. He can feel Ishara’s soothing, cool magic wash over him as she whispers gentle words. She’s promising to protect him. This whiff of a girl who holds the fate of Thedas in her hands, is offering to protect _him_ from himself.  

He should be holding her, vowing to kill and die for her, but all he can do is snag her about the waist and cling like a child afraid of the dark. Head buried in her stomach, his arms feel huge and clumsy, like they wrap twice around her thin frame. Is he hurting her? He’s squeezing so hard and _Maker_ his voice is breaking as he begs.

He’s blubbering nonsense, weeping wet messy tears into her night shift and pleading “Please don’t leave me. Stay, _oh Maker_ , _please please_ stay with me....” 

“I’m not going anywhere, vhenan,” she soothes, and Cullen squeezes harder.

 

\----

 

Solas wakes to the sound of abject terror coming from the Commander’s private quarters.

Maybe he’d gone too far in taking the Demon’s form. Standing in that horror of abominations, death and festering corpses, was shocking despite his jealous rage. He’d heard about the Commander’s past at the Circle Tower when it fell during the Blight, but he didn’t know the extent of his experience.

Solas runs a hand over his head, exhausted from expanding his Will in the Fade as such. He almost felt sorry for the the young Templar left mentally and physically violated in that cell.

Using the Inquisitor as a weapon to rend Cullen even more… _Fehendis_. He’d gone too far.

Solas steps out on the bridge between his abode and the Commander’s and hears the wracking sobs. He feels the cool breeze of Ishara’s magic washing over the area. She’s soothing her lover. Comforting and protecting him and she gentles him back to sleep with a spell of peace and tranquility. 

Solas closes his eyes and drinks in the feel of her frosty, clean magic; like the balm of Winter’s first breath on an Autumn day. He _yearns_ yet again. She should be his, if only for a short while.

Solas finds that he does not worry so much about his trespasses in Cullen’s dreams any longer and he slams the door as he re enters his sanctuary. 

The next day, Solas is feeling surly and raw and perhaps a bit cruel, his jealousy making him foolish. He sees Cullen leaving the War Room, looking haggard and spent. 

The elf smirks wickedly. “Not sleeping well, Commander?” he asks. 

The former Templar stops cold and stares and Solas holds his gaze, brashly daring Cullen to make the connection. _Let him know_ , he thinks, boldly. _What could he possibly do?_  

Solas well versed in making terrible mistakes… 

\-------

 

Cullen watches the apostate saunter back into his rotunda, his mind reeling.

 _What in the…_ Cullen feels cold then hellfire hot all over.

“That _fucking_ bastard,” Cullen doesn’t care who’s heard him curse.  

His blood is boiling in his veins and he feels something else simmering and screaming for release. Something he hadn’t tapped into in ages and _holy_ _Andraste’s ass_ but he wants to use it now. 

The door to Solas’ rotunda slams and echoes as Cullen barges in. 

“You bastard,” he growls, low and deadly. 

Solas doesn’t insult him by trying to deny anything. He simply clasps his hands behind his back, every bit the snooty professor who knows all the answers but will give none away. 

He raises a sculpted brow. “I never realized how weak and easily manipulated the Shemlan mind can be. No wonder you fear demon possession so.” 

Cullen’s teeth grind together so hard they might have cracked and there is a sudden, shocking release. Raw power rolls through his veins, singing in his blood as his Templar ability awakens after so many years of dormancy. 

His fist is drawing back and the mage as a superior smirk on his face, no doubt about to enjoy watching Cullen break his hand on the barrier he’ll conjure.

So there is great satisfaction in the crunch of knuckles meeting jaw as the spell purge surges outward from Cullen’s body, nullifying any and all magic in the area. Solas flies backward, his mana dispelled, sapped and his body flings helpless against a table. Books and papers flutter haphazardly to the floor like wounded birds. 

Solas splutters, blood slurring his words in a most enjoyable way. “But, you _abstain_ from lyrium!” 

“I don’t need lyrium for all of my abilities,” Cullen’s snarl is all teeth. 

Cullen drops to one knee and snatches Solas by his tunic. Blinding energy surges through him, pulsing and flowing as if thanking him for the release after an age of slumber. His is a magic with only one purpose, to work in only _one_ way. It radiates from Cullen like an aura, an ever widening wave, greedy and so very strong.  

He breathes out as he pulls the mage closer, blood dripping lazily from Solas’ mouth and lip. 

“Invade my dreams again, elf, and I will _end_ you. The Inquisitor will not stop me. The Nightingale, nor the Seeker or the bloody Maker himself will stop me.”

Cullen hears the door open and the heavy thuds of footfalls rushing closer. Bull’s voice is booming and his huge hands are on Cullen, pulling him back. Varric is there as well, half-pulling Solas away from the Commander’s fury. 

“Shit, Cullen!” Bull says, impressed yet still trying to steer Cullen out the door. Cullen is still glaring death at Solas and reveling in the fear in the apostate’s eyes. “What did you do?” 

Outside the door there are several soldiers and a few nobles; Dorian is standing well away, looking a little faint. 

Cullen’s starting to feel the drain of directing so much power and not having the lyrium to recover. 

“That was one hell of a punch, Commander.” Bull slaps Cullen a little too hard on the back. “Baldy needed to be taken down a few notches, I say.” 

Cullen wants to agree, but the ability to simply walk without stumbling is becoming more a priority. He’s so damn tired... 

“Whoa, easy there tiger,” Bull catches him as he sways sideways. 

Cullen pushes off the Qunari’s chest. “I’m fine. Really.” 

Dorian steps forward and rubs a hand over his face, looking like he’d just run the entire ridgeline of the Frostbacks. 

“The Vint here came and got me and Varric right when shit was about to go down between you and Solas.” 

“Charming,” Dorian drawls, frowning at Bull. “I told them our dear Commander seems to have tapped into his long lost Templar abilities and to be quite honest, you are rather terrifying.” 

Cullen frowns, “What…” 

“I couldn’t do anything to stop the two of you, since you nullified that entire _wing_ of Skyhold,” Dorian explains. “Enchanter Fiona and a few of her former circle mages were quite distressed. I’ll admit, feeling all my magic suddenly… _gone_ … isn’t something I want to experience again.” 

Cullen feels like a bastard. Like a brash young idiot, so full of himself instead of using his head. He should have known not to unleash that much raw nullification power. What if Ishara had been… _oh Maker…_

“The Inquisitor-” Cullen must look desperate because even Bull is trying to pat him comfortingly, if not a bit painfully, on his mantled shoulder. 

“Nah, she’s taking care of some business with Cole,” Bull says. 

“No doubt that would have been a disaster,” Dorian supplies helpfully. 

Cullen scowls and runs his hands through his hair. Maker’s breath, he feels as if he needs a months worth of sleep. 

“You’d better rest, Commander. Without lyrium, you natural abilities don't have the stamina or recovery,” Dorian says. “I can help with some rejuvenation potions, at least until my magic recovers.” 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” Cullen tries, fails. “It was stupid of me.”

“Hey, sounds like Solas probably got what he deserved. He’s been skulking around like an assassin with a bug up his ass for months since you started fucking the Boss.” 

Bull chuckles at Cullen’s aghast look. “Oh please, everyone knows. Good on, ya. She’s amazing and you two, well, you’re good for each other. I been sayin’ you’ve need your cork popped in the worst way- ”

Cullen finds the energy to growl. “Don’t.” 

Bull holds up his hands with a genial smile. “Sorry.” 

“Indeed,” Dorian agrees. “And while I agree that Solas got his much needed comeuppance, please take your nullification fisticuffs outside Skyhold.” 

“I think you may be right,” Cullen says, the dregs of his power ebbing finally and his blood settling. He’s still raw and exhausted and aches so badly for his love at that moment he feels a lump lodge in his throat.

“C’mon, Cullen. Let's get you a drink… or ten.” Bull jostles his shoulder goodnaturedly. 

“That,” Cullen breathes, smiling at last, “would be appreciated.”

 

-End-

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> So my best friend said "Hey play this game, it's awesome." And now I've been addicted for months. I fell in love with video game characters. I adore Cullen with the passion of the ages but I also love my Wolf Boy Solas. And here we are, me writing fic after a couple of years of NOTHING for a video game and planning out other works. Help?
> 
> On the Templar abilities: I'm theorizing that even off the lyrium, Cullen can still tap into a few of his abilities, like the spell purge. Alistair had Templar abilities and he wasn't on the lyrium, and Casandra as well. I love the idea of Cullen having these "magics" to fight "magic". 
> 
> Thanks to Shiperwolf for the idea and for all the cheerleading!


End file.
